


The Distance of Eternity

by AbsolXGuardian



Category: BBC Ghosts, Ghosts (TV 2019)
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Found Family, Internalized Homophobia, M/M, References to Period Typical Homophobia, The Captain coming out, The Captain's backstory, canon character death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-11
Updated: 2019-07-02
Packaged: 2020-05-01 16:40:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 6,479
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19181743
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AbsolXGuardian/pseuds/AbsolXGuardian
Summary: The Captain loved someone one, but after the Captain died, he left the Button House and was never seen again. The Captain never knew what happened to his love, until the History Channel changes its schedule and a documentary about unconventional World War 2 Veterans airs instead of Tanks.





	1. The Past

_"...but while Beck was able to live a relatively open life in Israel, when most soldiers returned home, nothing had changed-"_

The Captain sat on the couch in front of the TV, his swagger stick resting on his knees, at the proper time. The grandfather clock confirmed it. But when the channel came back from the commercial break (he had Alison turn the TV on during the break to give him time to get settled), it wasn't _Tanks_. In fact, it seemed to be the middle of some other documentary. The Captain would have called Alison back into the room, if it wasn't for the name he heard next.

_"One such soldier was lieutenant John Sampson, who after returning-"_

The Captain's heart would have dropped to the floor if he still had a corporeal one, and it certainly felt that way. He tuned out the narrator woman's voice and he focused on the picture in front of him.

_Jack..._

He still remembered the feeling of Jack's lips against his own, of his bright green eyes. As his memories faded, images becoming nothing more than stories, a fading dream, those moments remained as clear as they were the day he died.

And there he was. The documentary had switched from an old photo of Jack, a cropped group photo of their company, and some archive footage, to _him_.

The Captain didn't need the text on the screen to tell him who the man that sat on the ratty sofa was. Liver spots dotted his face, aged lined him, but those eyes. He was so old, and it was so wrong. The Captain sat here the same, but Jack...

The swagger stick fell from the Captain's hands and clattered on the floor. He didn't notice.

The Captain didn't really hear Jack's response to the interviewer's question. He was too absorbed in just watching his lover speak. The more he looked, the more he could see the little ways that he was still the same, in the way he moved and spoke. He may not have heard the words, but he heard the nervousness and the barely contained emotion. And the voice, it was the same. If he closed his eyes, he could pretend nothing had changed.

_"Well, I first met Charlie when I first got assigned. I was an NCO and Charlie was my lieutenant."_

_Charlie_...no one had called him that since, since, the night before he died. And it was Jack then. His last morning, that whirlwind, it was all just Captain or his last name. And his fellow ghosts- there was a reason he hadn't told them his name. The shield of formality the Captain wasn't even aware of, they'd disrespect it. And in turn, he'd even started to lose it. The Captain was the ghost. Captain Charles Connell the man, and Charlie another man entirely.

" _The moment I saw him, I had a crush on him. Which is pretty awkward when he's shouting at you all the time. I thought I'd have to just ignore it, like I always did. I mean, he was so formal and stern..._ " Jack trailed off.

The Captain never knew that, but he remembered when he first saw Jack in that line up as well. His was the only face that stood out from the mass of men he now commanded. He told himself that he only noticed Jack because his muscles indicated that he'd be an exceptional soldier, to try to bury those- _inappropriate_ feelings welling up within him. It would only lead to pain. Sampson might not even survive the month.

There was another cut, and Jack responded to another unheard question. " _So I didn't think it would come to anything. But really, war is mostly waiting and drilling. But there was one day my sergeant sent me to get some mutations from a back room, and I found Charlie reading a book, sitting on one of the crates._ " Jack laughed, an echo of a laugh, remembering a funny moment that was now tinged with grief. " _I had to keep myself from laughing. It was just so weird, the book, I think it was some adventure thing, and he was an officer- he could do that. But there he was, sitting on a munitions crate like it was a park bench._ "

The Captain couldn't remember what book it was either, but he knew he had already read it several times. When Jack entered the room, the jolt of fear wasn't that he was caught doing something he'd never gotten explicit permission for, but that he was now alone with the man whom only seeing out of the corner of his eye already sent electricity through his body.

" _Charlie, well he was a gentleman. He was so flustered about it, and I think on some level I realized he liked men as well- liked me at that moment. He offered to help me carry the box. And I was sure I was blushing bright red that moment. I'm not certain what happened, but we were both so nervous and clumsy that we ended up entangled on the floor. His face was inches from mine, and well I just reached out and kissed him. I instantly pulled back. It was like a haze had just been lifted, and only the sharpness of reality was left. It- it was pretty stupid. In that moment- well I was less afraid in combat than I was then. And if I had been wrong-_ " Jack let the last part remain unsaid, the implication was clear.

The Captain remembered that moment well. At first, he thought he'd imagined the kiss. With their bodies touching like that, well his own failings could cause him to imagine the desires he didn't dare to confront. But when he saw the pure fear on Jack's face, he knew it was real. The terror on his lover's face was like a knife between his ribs.

" _Well, that moment stretched out for so long, but then, Charlie leaned down and we started making out. I-_ " Jack choked back a sob, " _We almost kept going. I'd started to take his shirt off when he stopped me. From the way he talked, it was part fear of delaying me, and part- well I guess what you'd call internalized homophobia today._ "

When the Captain had stopped Jack, he thought he was showing resistant. He couldn't give into the unnatural urges he'd worked so hard to ignore and bring another man down with him. That was his first thought, the stuff about Jack's sergeant looking for him, that was just to try and convince him to leave.

" _So I did. And well those next few weeks...it was even harder. Now I knew Charlie felt the same way, but he always made a point to avoid me after that, to not even look at me._ "

Those weeks were torturous to the Captain as well. Jack was right, even looking at him reminded the Captain of how Jack's lips felt against his own. He'd even thought about coming up with an excuse to have Jack transferred out of his command. And he was so glad he never did, for he soon realized he would have regretted it for the rest of his life.

" _When it all changed? Well, there was this battle and my squad, we were scattered. Two of them died, and I was separated from the group. I stumbled back into camp a few hours later, covered in mud, but unharmed._ "

That night, when Jack didn't return from battle, the Captain thought the fear alone would kill him. He'd lost men under his command, he knew he would. You just had to block that out, not fully think about it. But if his own actions had gotten Jack killed, he would hate himself for that. And so he spent those hours, each minute feeling like an eternity, hating himself for being so attached. To make matters worse, pragmatically he knew he couldn't even ask after Jack specifically. That would be too suspicious. There were other men under him still missing.

Jack was the only one who returned.

The Captain couldn't even remember the names of those who didn't. For all the grief consuming him in that moment, the reminder of those he lost, of those he failed, didn't change anything. The walls the Captain had carefully built during his afterlife may have been torn down, but there are some walls that can never be felled.

" _I saw Charlie, he had to be waiting for me, trying to look nonchalant. He rushed towards me. I could feel the joy radiating off him. But we both knew that we couldn't even hug in public because of the rank difference. So we went to his bunkroom._ "

All the Captain remembered of that night was the emotion, the exhilaration, and the feeling of Jack's bare skin against his own. It was something about realizing how fragile and fleeting life was that let him lose all resistant. He couldn't waste it, no matter how wrong a small voice inside him told him he was. It was beautiful.

He was in love.

" _You don't get much privacy on the front. It was all stolen glances and moments. Sometimes we'd just hide in that storeroom and talk. But the threat of the enemy was always there. Germans were always over the horizon. Sometimes I felt like a spy deep in enemy territory. We didn't discuss it, but the idea of the men I called my brothers turning on me in a moment-  that scared me more than any court-martial._ "

 _Jack..._ Jack had never told the Captain that. The fear was always there, it was the kind of fear that you became tired of, just like any fear in war. But there was always a small part of him focused on listening for approaching footsteps. The Captain, for his part, always felt like he was doing something wrong, even if he rationalized it as guilt for putting Jack in danger. And now he envied Jack's lack of shame, whether he always had it, or if it was something time granted to him. Alison had told the ghosts that things were easier for people like him now, but still...the bravery telling his story had to take.

" _There was one more battle on the front. The Germans had us on the run..._ " Jack stared into the middle distance, before giving his head a quick shake. " _The few of us still alive, we retreated back to the bunkers. Charlie...he made it. We- we were relieved, but most of our company was gone._ "

The Captain didn't know if the documentary people had cut it out, or if Jack simply didn't remember- but he did. It was dark in the bunker, as planes clashed above them. He and Jack, they were just so overjoyed the other was still alive. They had clung to each other in the dark, assuming they would die anyway. When they did, they wanted to do it in each other's arms.

" _After that, we were so depleted, we were recalled to England. Some brass and intelligence folks were set up in this old manor house in the country. We weren't good for much, but our injured could also convalesce in the hospital part, so the few able-bodied of us left were sent there to provide security. We both got promotions. I made lieutenant and Charlie became our new captain._

 _As captain, Charlie got his own full room. I'd sneak in there every night. Sometimes he'd read to me, or we'd talk. Other times we'd cuddle, or more, but a lot of times he fell asleep right when I arrived._ "

Those nights, the Captain had been forcing himself to stay awake, so that he'd have a few stolen moments with his lover, and could fall asleep in his arms.

And that first night dead, he was so alone. There was a reason the Captain was so insistent about getting a new room after Heather died, and the garden view wasn't it.

" _One morning-_ " Jack stopped and closed his eyes to stop the tears. Then he continued. With dread, the Captain realized what was next, " _He was running around, organizing something- when he just doubled over. I-I wanted to run to him, but I had to stop myself. Then he fainted, and they took him to the hospital. It- it was a heart attack._ "

In his last moments, the Captain remembered staring into Jack's eyes, the one stable point in a world that had suddenly become pain.

Then there was darkness.

And then there was a man in Regency clothing standing over his hospital bed.

As Jack continued to speak, the Captain reached his hand out towards the tv. He wanted to cup Jack's face in his hands again, to tell him that he was fine, that he wasn't gone.

" _I- I_ ," now Jack was fully crying, dabbing his tears with a tissue between sentences. " _I couldn't be with him. Everyone was worried, but they wouldn't let me into the hospital area. I had to be nobody to Charlie in their eyes. He- he was_ _everything_ _. And then he was gone, and- and-_ "

"It's okay, my love,"the Captain said aloud, believing for a moment that Jack was here in person, and that he could hear him, "I'm here now. Not a day has gone by since I haven't thought of you-" It wouldn't be like the time he had pushed past Thomas, not hearing the poet's warning about whomever he was looking for not being able to perceive him. There wouldn't be any of him reaching for Jack's hand, only for the shiver of wrongness when he passed through his body. It wouldn't be like how he hid in the attic until the army left, not just avoiding Jack, but avoiding the people he could no longer help. 

Then his hand touched the TV screen, and it was nothing more than grasping at a strong wind. There wasn't even the feeling of wrongness that came from touching a living being, it was nothing. A phantom impression of the electricity in the device traveled through the Captain's form, a reminder that he wasn't even really here.

The Captain dropped back to the couch, the full reality dawning. He was alone, and Jack was still out there. But they'd never be able to meet again. He'd never be able to hear Jack's impression of Churchill or be teased about how obsessive he was when it came to protocol. He'd never be able to touch him again, to hold him and feel their hearts beat in sync.

More than distance and time divided them now.

And tears began to roll down the Captain's face.

* * *

 

The documentary returned to Jack's interview from the pictures they were narrating over, but now Jack was sitting next to another man, holding his hand. The Captain almost got up and left, to just tear the bandage off and never think about- well all this, ever again, but then he noticed something.

Both Jack and the man next to him wore matching wedding bands. The Captain didn't know if they represented an informal ceremony, or if they were actually married, as Alison said same-sex couples could do now. That still felt like a dream to the Captain. Marriage had seemed like a luxury when he and Jack were worried about being hung.

But that was what kept the Captain from leaving, like watching the medics pull a screaming shrapnel victim away, one just had to watch.

" _Well_ ," Jack began, staring lovingly at the man beside him, " _I first met Lawrence at the Golden Calf, as you'd expect. We both served in the war, he was a pilot. We started talking and it turned out his squadron was the one that relieved us. And so we just started hanging out. He was at the Calf, so he had to be into men, but I was still thinking about Charlie-_ "

" _It was pretty weird_ ," the other man, Lawrence cut in, " _You were so closed off, I thought maybe you didn't get the memo about Soho. It went on like that until one night-_ "

" _Hey, I'm the one they asked to tell the story_ ," Jack teased. The easygoing banter Jack had with this Lawrence, it cut through the Captain's being. And it was so different from the somber man telling the story previously. Just being around Lawrence seemed to bring Jack back to the man the Captain once knew.

" _So that night_ ," Jack continued, " _We were walking back from the Calf to our shared flat and Lawrence grabbed my hand. He pulled me in, and we kissed-_ "

" _I had a bit too much to drink that night._ "

" _-It had been something I wanted to do for so long, but it felt unfaithful to Charlie. But then I realized I couldn't keep living for a dead man._ "

The Captain saw it in his mind's eye. A street in Soho, the London skyline still distorted from the Blitz. No one else out in the cold night, the moon the only witness. Jack in his civies-

It should have been him.

" _So we fell in love. A few years later our friends arranged an unofficial marriage ceremony. We're very happy together and grateful we were able to grow old together- a lot of people didn't. I think, that if Charlie is looking down on me, he'd want me to move on, to be happy._ "

Did he? The Captain zoned out whatever Jack was talking about next, and focused on Lawrence. He tried to hate Lawrence, but couldn't. All the anger he tried to muster up just fell back and redirected itself inward. Just look at all of the happiness Lawrence had brought to his precious Jack's life. No, he couldn't wish that  Jack had remained alone, that would have to be his burden to bear. The living moved on, that's what they did. It was ghosts who didn't change, that was part of their very nature.

And so alone, the Captain brought his head down into his hands and began to silently cry.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I don't know much about infantry's day-to-day stuff in WW2, and I couldn't easily find any good sources on it, so I left it vague. If there are any historical inaccuracies that could easily be fixed, let me know. Soho was historically the queer district of London, while the Golden Calf was the first gay bar in London (there is now a Gordon Ramsy restaurant on the site). Gad Beck was a gay Jewish resistance fighter. He's very cool, so I had to include a reference to him.
> 
> For timeline stuff, Jack was a fair bit younger than the Captain, but the documentary was also filmed in the 90s. By the time of the show, both Jack and Lawrence died natural deaths.
> 
> Thank you to Cacaxa on discord for giving me the motivation to keep writing by responding to the snippets I sent her and coming up with the last name for the Captain and Lawrence's name.
> 
> The next chapter will soon, since it's summer, and as I said after finishing SOTE, I plan to write shorter chapters and post more frequently. It will be less painful than this one and will cover Alison comforting Captain and him coming out to his ghostly family.


	2. The Future

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Captain has been forced to confront his past, and that the man he loved moved on without him. Now, with Alison's help, it is his turn to change.

"Alison, there's something wrong with the Captain!" Pat ran through the wall of the kitchen to where Alison was typing an email on her laptop to the archaeologists about the plague pit.

Alison closed the lid of her computer and stood up. "What is it?"

"He- he," Pat spluttered out, legitimately afraid, "He's crying!"

Alison's world shifted into focus. It would have been less concerning to hear that he had finally snapped and was trying to find out if ghosts could die a second time by attempting to murder Jullian.

"Where is he?"

"He's in the- I don't remember what it's called but it's the room with the television!"

Alison glanced at her watch. It was still the Captain's  _ Tanks _ time. Had he watched something that dug up old traumas? She'd privately worried before about the Captain's insistence on watching things related to his war, but she assumed he knew how to handle it.

Alison power-walked through the labyrinth hallways of the Button House, while Pat trailed behind her, phasing through walls to keep pace with her in the narrow corridors. 

"Wait." Alison held up her hand as she arrived at the door to the television room. Pat stopped suddenly behind her.

"It might be better if I went in there alone." Alison turned around to face Pat. "I know you mean well, and honestly you're the best ghost to have in this situation, but the Captain still thinks of himself as your leader. He might be hesitant to open up around you."

For a moment Pat looked crestfallen, but then he returned to his worried face and nodded. "You're right. It is what's best for him."

"Oh and no peeking," Alison added as she went through the door.

* * *

 

 

Alison walked into the room to find the Captain with his head cupped in his hands, quietly sobbing. The telly played on, but he obviously wasn't paying any attention to it.

"Cap, are you okay?" Alison asked as she sat down beside the Captain on the couch. On the telly were two elderly men being interviewed, and it sounded like the one on the left was talking about the Brittish gay rights movement.

The Captain sat up, his usual rim-rod straight posture returning. "Yes, I'm fine Alison," he wiped his eyes with the corner of his sleeve. He hadn’t even bothered to tell Alison not to use his nickname. Alison saw actual tears on his face. She didn't know that ghosts could physically cry.

"I know you aren't," Alison pushed, summoning all of her 'helping your friends through their emotional trauma' skills. "You've been crying."

"It's just dust in my eye."

Alison saw the way the Captain looked at the man on the left. She remembered the way the Captain acted went she explained how far gay rights had come along in recent years. He didn't say anything and excused himself when Fanny started ranting about George. And of course, there was the topic of the interview. 

Alison grabbed the remote and turned the telly off right as it was transitioning to talking about someone called Witold Pilecki.

"Captain," Alison asked, "was one of those people- were they your boyfriend?"

The Captain flinched away and suddenly looked very guarded. Right, Alison realized, the kind of fear of being outed the Captain endured when he was alive would still be a part of him.

"It's okay," Alison held out her hands in the 'calm down' motion, "You know I'm not going to be like people from your time. You're safe. You can tell me."

The fear the Captain had been projecting crumbled and only his grief remained. "He- he was. The one on the left, his name was Jack...." The Captain had to stop to hold back a fresh burst of tears.

Alison didn't know what to say. The things one learned while trying to be a good friend certainly didn’t include 'how to help the ghost of a gay man from the 40s deal with the fact his lover outlived him'.

But she didn't need to, for the Captain started speaking again. "I...I've never told anyone that before...the other ghosts- they don't even know..."

"It's fine," Alison said. She almost reached out to pat the Captain on the back, but she remembered that she wouldn't be able to interact with him. "Times change, but you've been stuck in here. Look at Jack, he was telling his story to the public in a documentary. He wouldn't do that if he didn't feel safe." 

The Captain nodded. "Jack...after I died, he- he moved on. He's everything to me...I never stopped missing him. But he just went and found someone else."

"Is he happy?"

"What?" The Captain finally turned to look at Alison.

"I said, is Jack happy?"

"Well of course. But-"

"Cap, you died. Jack didn't know that you became a ghost. I know you feel like you were replaced, but would you rather have Jack be sad his whole life?"

"No," the Captain squeezed his wrist and stared at the floor. "I don't hate him. Or Lawrence. I want to, but it's me. I left him behind. He was alone when he went home, he was alone for the rest of the war. And I didn't even die in battle! There's no one to blame. I died of a heart attack of all things."

"Well then it wasn't your fault," Alison said, so grateful it seemed like there were right things to say that could help the Captain. "It was just bad luck. It could have happened to anyone. You're always going to miss him, but at least now you know he's happy."

"You're right," the Captain said, his projected stoicism almost impeccable. He sat up straight again and picked up his swagger stick from the ground.

Alison and the Captain sat in silence together for a few more awkward moments.

"I don't want things to stay the same," he whispered, barely loud enough for Alison to hear.

"What?"

"Well, now that I was feeling better, I was going to do what I always do after  _ Tanks _ , scout the perimeter. But I use that time to think about the show- and I don't want to do that. So I decided to try to play chess with Robin. I would also tell you to check the guide in the future, to avoid any more surprises like this. But...it doesn't feel right. I don't want things to go back to the way they were."

"If you wanted to," Alison said, forming the plan as she talked, "you could come out. That's when you tell other people that you're gay. I know most of the ghosts are older than you, but they're good people, so they'll get over their prejudices."

The Captain stared into the middle distance and his breathing sped up slightly. Alison worried she'd said something wrong, that she'd pushed him to far. 

Then the Captain shook his head and broke out of his trance. "You're right," he said, his usual bluster finally returned,  "I'm a soldier, I should be able to charge in despite my fear. They're also physically incapable of harming me in any meaningful way if things were to go terribly.

"Um, yeah," Alison said, not sure if she was supposed to laugh or be concerned for the Captain when it came to the last part.

The Captain stood up. "Well then, you should best gather everyone for a group meeting."

* * *

 

All the ghosts were gathered in the library. Jullian laid on the length of the entire couch, not caring about how rude it was. Alison sat on a chair a little bit away, indicating that she wasn't part of the conversation, but that she would step in if things got out of hand. Thomas had sat on the other chair next to Alison, but then Alison picked up her chair and moved it even farther back, and Thomas felt too awkward to move. Mary, Robin, and Kitty all sat on the other couch.  Fanny remained standing behind the couch the other three ghosts sat on, while the Captain stood in the middle, all eyes on him. This was the typical arrangement for a house meeting, but this wasn't a typical meeting.

The Captain was terrified. And the part of it that was the most terrifying was the unknown. In war, it was a fear you could fight against. You were smart, followed orders, and fought. You knew who your enemy was. And even if you were fighting snipers, there was something to do just watch. And if you could only wait, then you knew nothing you could do would change anything. When it was fear of being outed, it was all a matter of doing and hiding the right  things, of being suspicious of everyone. The other ghosts, they were his unit- his family. He should be able to trust them, but every instinct said he shouldn't, not with this part of him. Fanny's own past could turn her against him. Mary could end up just repeating the same things he heard at church as a boy. He should just make something up, and hope that Alison  understood. That was what decades of self-preservation instincts told him to do. He didn't know how they would react. If they would scorn him, pity him, or accept him. If he knew how they would react, he could feel confident in whatever choice he made. But he couldn't. There was an abyss in front of him. All he could do was jump.

And pray he came out intact on the other side.

"So are we just going to stand here, or do you have an announcement to make?" Fanny asked, bringing the Captain back to reality.

"Ah yes," the Captain cleared his throat, "this announcement is of a much more personal nature. It specifically has to do with my past, which you know I rarely talk about. Thomas you may remember, right after I died, there was a man I desperately attempted to speak with, despite your warnings. That man, Jack, was my lover,” The Captain kept going, without waiting to stop, to just be done with it. “I’m gay.”

Then the Captain closed his eyes, like he was readying himself against shrapnel.

"I knew it!" Julian hooted, before the impact got its chance to settle in.

"Excuse me?" The Captain opened his eyes. He felt a jolt of fear as a trained reaction.

"Well of course! It's pretty obvious. You're always commenting about how you find men attractive. There was that construction worker-" Julian started counting off on his fingers. "-the movie guy-"

"Adam," the Captain muttered on instinct.

"See! That just proves my point. And let's not forget Mike."

* * *

 

 

Mike was walking by the library when he heard his wife shout "What?"

He leaned in and saw that Alison was sitting in a chair, watching something going on near the couches. It was probably the ghosts, and Mike would never get over how weird it was that such a thought made sense.

"What's going on?"

"Oh," Alison said quickly, making a shoo-ing motion with her hand and not turning away from what she was watching. "The World War Two guy is coming out as gay and apparently he finds you attractive."

"...okay." Mike decided to just leave. Life in this house was already so goddamn weird, that might as well be a thing.

* * *

 

"Ah, so you be a bugger," Mary said, with her normal cheer. 

"That is correct," the Captain said, trying to stay civil. Other than Fanny, Mary was the one he was the most worried about. "Although, given my understanding, that isn't considered respectful terminology today, I know you don't mean anything by it."

"And he not be in cahoots with the devil?" Mary asked Alison.

"No, we've been over this before," Alison replied.

"I knows. I'es just checking." Mary rested her hands on her lap, indicating she had nothing more to say on the matter.

The Captain was suddenly surprised to find Pat had rushed up and hugged him. The Captain awkwardly raised his arms up to avoid returning the hug out of surprise.

"Ummmm..." The Captain asked.

Pat looked up, tears in his own eyes. "I'm just so happy that you felt comfortable enough to tell us. And you've been through so much. People always telling you your love was wrong, I couldn't imagine something like that, and you hid it for so long. I'm sad that you had to go through all that, but I'm so happy that things have changed now and that you can stop hiding. And- And-"

While Jullian's teasing embarrassed him, and he only felt relief with how Mary or anyone else hadn't said anything horrible, it was Pat who caused joy to blossom through his being. The Captain reached down and returned the hug, having to stop his own tears, this time tears of joy.

After what the Captain assumed was a reasonable amount of time for hugging in this situation, Pat returned to his seat. Alison gave the Captain double thumbs up and beamed.

"Me don't see why big deal," Robin started, "Was fine with tribe, it good for orphans. But your people mean. You afraid. Me happy you trust. Me accept you."

Again, the Captain had to hold back tears of joy. They weren't just because of Robin's acceptance, but the idea that Robin once lived in- that there was a world that lacked homophobia. He wanted to ask about how Robin's tribe treated their gay people, but that was something he could do later. 

"Thank you, Robin." A small smile slipped through the Captain's facade.

"I, for one," Thomas began, "think that your life now has all the makings of a great romantic tragedy. Forbidden love, war, death tearing you away from your lover. In fact, if you could tell me more, I could begin to record-"

"Don't." The Captain said in his absolutely serious voice, starring Thomas down. He knew it was just the kind of person Thomas was, and wanting to write a poem about it was his way of showing he cared, but those few sentences of Thomas talking about Jack already made him extremely uncomfortable. He never had the luxury to be dramatic when it came to his love, and he didn't want to let Thomas do it for him.

Thankfully Thomas got the message and shut up.

During the entire conversation, Kitty had sat silently with her brow furrowed in concentration as she tried to work past the biases of her time and understand what was actually going on. She finally figured it out, and was now able to inject her trademark cheer into the conversation.

"Wait if you like men, that means we can have sleepovers and talk about eligible bachelors!" Kitty clapped her hands together. "Alison is always busy. Mary gets all weird about it."

"E's a sin to think about fornication," Mary explained, "Good marriages are chosens by one'es elders."

"See what I mean! Fanny is the same and she won't let me have sleepovers with any of the guys."

"Well of course!" Fanny interjected, "a man and a lady gossiping together, let alone sleeping in the same room is the very height of impropriety." An opportunity to lecture on proper social etiquette seemed to be enough for a momentary break in Fanny's self-enforced steely silence. In most meetings, she would have already spoken by now, but it seemed she had much to work through.

"Yes, but the Captain isn't interested in women, so it has to be fine!" Kitty turned to look at the Captain, expectantly waiting for an answer.

The Captain cleared his throat to give himself some extra time to think. "Thank you for the offer Catherine, but I don't think I would feel particularly comfortable talking about such things, at least for a while. I'm naturally a very private person, and when I was alive, talking about who I found attractive would put my life in danger. Perhaps at a future date, but I can make no guarantees."

"Alright," Kitty replied, unfazed. 

The Captain thought about Kitty's offer. He had lived, and even just existed, for so long in fear when it came to his sexuality, it was a process carved into his mind. Even now, part of him still wanted to run and say it was all a joke. The most likely thing was that Kitty's offer was just her trying to befriend him based on their newly discovered common ground, but perhaps she was more clever than she let on. After giving it a second thought, it seemed unlikely, but perhaps Kitty knew that he would still be gun-shy when it came to his attractions and that she thought that a sleepover would help him get over it. It would be pretty damn clever it that was the case.

Jullian shifted from his lounging position to sitting upright. "We've all given our thoughts, but I see you haven't said anything yet," he directed towards Fanny. "I've always thought 'if you don't have anything nice to say, don't say anything at all' wasn't part of your fancy pants etiquette, but I guess it is."

"How dare you!" Fanny snapped, before quickly reigning it in, because that was the proper thing to do. But now all eyes were on her.

Fanny took a deep breath to steady herself. "I suppose, based on my experiences, that you expect me to say something despicable about the Captain now. The whole idea does still make me uncomfortable, but so do Alison's bare knees. And I no longer think of her as lesser for her dress choices. Alison has also explained to me that if George was allowed to be who he was, he likely wouldn't have married, then cheated on, and finally murdered me. But that he also was such a- well not a word a lady should repeat, but certainly one he deserves- that he probably would have treated a male partner just badly."

With that, the last source of immediate fear the Captain felt dissolved. He couldn't imagine Fanny reacting in a positive way, but he also couldn't go through with coming out if he thought of how she would likely react. What the Captain actually got seemed like the best he could ever have hoped for.

Fanny turned to face the Captain, and for a moment that fear returned, it seemed she wasn't done. "Just to confirm," she asked, "you weren't married to a woman?"

"No," he replied. He didn't want to point out that before the war he had put off his parents prodding on the topic for as long as he could, and he likely would have been pressured into a marriage if he had survived the war, because Fanny won't be sympathetic to such a thing, seeing as George likely went through something similar.

"And neither was your- and neither was this Jack?"

"Correct, and he never did."

"Well then, you weren't unfaithful or neglectful of your marital duties. And I know you don't share any of George's other despicable qualities. There is no reason for me to compare you two."

"Thank you, Fanny. And thank all of you I didn't say anything for so long, because I couldn't handle you reacting badly. I couldn't handle you looking at me and seeing a monster or someone who needs help. I know you're my unit- no you're my family, but my family, my friends, and those I commanded when I was alive would have."

The Captain scanned the faces of his family and knew that the way each of them reacted to him coming out was them showing their acceptance and support in their own way. They were all a mess, even him. But they loved each other. And they could change, they didn't have to remain bound by the values of their time. He'd still have the constant pain of missing Jack, but like the pain in his knees, it could easily be ignored. He had his family, and people who loved him, as Jack did. Sure it wasn't romantic, but that didn't really matter. Both times, it was true love.

And the Captain realized this must be how Jack felt about Lawrence. He was kept from the love of his life by a distance greater than location, time, or even perception. And it was a separation that would only grow as more of eternity past. He would never stop yearning for Jack, just as Jack never stopped yearning for him. But apart they found a new source of love to sustain them.

  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Since this chapter is a lot less angst-y, I decide to slip in a few jokes in the narration. This is based on a comedy after all. I hope with Mike's scene I was able to capture the way the show cuts between showing the ghosts and not showing them.
> 
> Historical notes:
> 
> Witold Pilecki was a Polish resistance fighter who faked papers to get into Auschwitz to figure out what was going on and stage a resistance from within. After the war, he went on to record accounts of Soviet atrocities in Poland during the war. Poland, a Soviet puppet state, executed him for it. He's one of my historical heroes, so I decided to reference him in the fic. 
> 
> The thing about Robin's tribe finding gay people useful for taking care of orphans comes from an article I read theorizing on the evolutionary advantage of homosexuality in humans. The main theory is that have a subset of your community not being interested in bearing their own children can assist in rearing orphans and/or their sibling's children.
> 
> If your confused about how the Captain says he couldn't do any dramatic/poetic gestures of love towards Jack, but there are all these historical very affectionate letters between men, because of ww1, men showing affection was out and not showing any emotion was in.


End file.
